


never met before (at least not in real life)

by spock



Category: 1917 (2019)
Genre: Blood and Injury, Canon Compliant, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Grief/Mourning, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Post-Canon, Pre-Relationship, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-12
Updated: 2020-01-12
Packaged: 2021-02-27 03:28:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,108
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22220332
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spock/pseuds/spock
Summary: The Officer stops and turns to him. His similarity to his brother takes Schofield’s breath away.
Relationships: Jospeh Blake/William Schofield
Comments: 46
Kudos: 385





	never met before (at least not in real life)

**Author's Note:**

> summary from the screenplay.

A smattering of artillery discharges somewhere to the left of him, far enough away that Will doesn't bother opening his eyes. He stays there, propped up against the tree, listening to the voices of men he doesn't know. 

The air in front of him shifts. He opens his eyes and takes in the dark of the evening, wondering just when it was that he dropped off. The overcast shrowding the countryside for the better part of the week seems to have finally caught on a strong enough wind to take it elsewhere; the moon overhead is bright enough to light up the expanse of the field they're settled in on their side of the front. 

That same light catches on the face of the man standing in front of him, highlighting the angles. 

Will blinks. "Tom?" The name is scraped from the back of his throat. 

A laugh comes, quiet and rueful and nothing at all like what Will is used to from so similar an accent. Blake crouches down, sitting on his haunches. He says, "It's Joseph, actually." The change in position fully illuminates the features of his face, the ways in which he looks nothing at all like Tom, and yet with all the similarities that made Will feel as if he might've been sick at the sight of him, after all that time Will had spent searching, heart in his throat. 

What Tom might have looked like, sounded like, had he been given a chance to grow up a little. 

Will rubs at his eyes with the back of his hand. He can still feel the grit from the explosion at the mind mines hovering in the corners. "Right," he says, blinking back tears. "You look like him." He lowers his arm, hand hovering at the corner of his mouth, swollen and tender from an injury he can't quite recall sustaining. His knuckle presses into his lip, a shock of pain bringing him back to himself for good, of all the half-remembered horrors he'd managed to escape in sleep. "Only older."

Blake stands tall again. He sticks a hand out to Will, flexing his fingers in the air between them. "He looks like me," he says, and the words roll from his lips like he's said them a million times before, back during a time when it was true. Will bites his tongue, wanting to scream and not having the faintest clue how to go about it. "Looked," Blake amends. Blake's expression the moment he says it will likely haunt him for the rest of his natural life, Will can tell that much the moment he sees it. As soon as it comes, it's gone, Blake burying it down into the same place where Will's hidden his own grief. 

Doesn't do to dwell on it. 

"Let's get some food in you." The fingers in front of Will's face twitch again. He takes them, letting Blake pull him until he's standing on his feet again. His hand is strong, warm. Will hadn't noticed that before, earlier, the first time they'd shaken hands. It's so much bigger than Tom's had been, weak and slippery with blood in the end. He doesn't want to let go. 

Will looks to Blake's face and their eyes catch. Both of their grips seem to tighten in the same instance, holding on. The bones in Will's hands creak, and he wonders if they'll snap. If he can manage to break Blake's fingers as well. Won't be much use then, neither of them. Might be that they'll get sent to the hospital, miles and miles back behind the line. A small chance that they'll get sent straight back to England, even. Conceivable that their bones will be so mangled that they'll have to stay together like this for the rest of their lives, fused-like. 

"Schofield." Blake's voice is agitated, and his grip lessens in an instant. Will feels a layer of wet come over his eyes, his plans going up in smoke. "Your hand is bleeding." 

He shudders out a breath and looks at his hand, cradled between both of Blake's. It's too dark out to make out any sort of colour, but he can see the patch of dark staining his already-sullied bandages. 

Blake's fingers, slick and stained with that same dark. 

"Oh," Will says. "Sorry." 

Blake's fingers stroke the edges of his palm, cradling his wrist. "What are you on about?" He's shorter than Will, has to look up so that their eyes can meet again. Will notices how close their faces are. He can't do much more than breathe, trying to remember what colour Blake's eyes are, if they were the same shade of blue that Tom's were. 

Everything becomes heavy. 

Will worries that he might do something stupid; for all that the world has seemed set on seeing him dead since this damned war broke out, he's never struggled in being his own worst enemy. 

"Hey," Blake says. "Never you mind, yeah? You'll be wanking again in no time."

Will chokes on his sob. 

Blake is kind enough not to call him on it, though he does shush him, gentle-like. 

"Wrong hand." Will presses the fleshy bit of his thumb to his forehead, trying to parse out the time. Two days, maybe. Tears catch on his lower row of lashes. He feels sick. "I can't eat."

Blake's hand settles on his elbow, the other coming to rest on his shoulder. He helps Will to sit down again, saying _alight_ under his breath, over and over again. "I'll make sure you get something in the morning," Blake trails off, seeming to think. "Wait here, just a moment." His hand squeezes Will's shoulder before he stands, walking away back towards where the RAMC have stationed themselves.

Will stares out into the night, trying to get a hold of himself. Everything's gone so wrong, and he hasn't the faintest idea what to do. He tries to remember how he used to keep himself together back in the 8th, at the Somme, even when he'd been safe at home, his family's expectations a looming threat so much more complex than the Huns could ever hope to be. 

Footsteps return. Will can't bring himself to look. Blake settles next to him, awkwardly folding to sit on the grass, his hands over-full with supplies, unable to assist in keeping him balanced. 

Everything feels like a dream, strange and unexpected, something he can't decide on deeming a nightmare instead. "You don't have to take care of me," Will says. "I've managed this far."

Blake settles his hoard off onto the grass at his side, freeing his hands. He takes hold of Will's injured one without so much as a by-your-leave, gently unravelling the soiled binding. 

"It's like you don't know me at all." He gives Will a smile, the even lines of his teeth catching in the moonlight. It's trouble. All of it. "Didn't Tom ever tell you about me?" 

Tom had, at times, though only in the abstract, old stories of home. The two of them didn't write to one another much, saving their letters for family back home. 

Will always sort of wondered if Tom knew. Suspected. It'd only taken a week of them knowing one another for Tom to learn the sort of questions to ask — the ones not to ask. 

Water poured over his palm, a crisp sting that brought Will back to himself, followed by the agony of Blake cleaning the wound with the single-minded determination of a layman who had more passion than he did training. Air punches itself from his lungs. Will chokes out, "Christ," and tries his best not to rip his hand away, know. 

"Talk," Blake commands. 

As if it's that easy. 

Will casts his eyes up to the stars and tries to disassociate himself from his body. "No," he bites out, struggling to keep focused. "We had other topics of interest."

"Yeah?" Blake asks. "Like what?"

Licking his lips, Will tries to think of anything at all that might be remotely of interest. "Your dog's having puppies."

Blake pours some more of his water over Will's palm, seemingly done. His fingers are infinitely more gentle as they dry the wound with a square of linen, wrapping Will's hand up in dressing again once that's finished. 

"Myrtle?" Blake sets Will's hand down onto the grass between their legs. "Hope mum'll get a good price for them. Myrtle's good stock."

Their eyes meet again, Blake staring at him expectantly. "Let me see your head."

"I don't think I can survive another one of your examinations." It feels so strange, to be taking the piss with a man he's only just met. Will can sense Tom in him, in the lines of his face and the cut of his humour; besides, for all that his hand feels better now that it's been seen to, hurt still rolls in the back of his stomach, sweat tacky at his neck. He just might faint if he's forced to deal with such pain again so soon.

"The cheek." Two of his fingers beckon Will closer, his chin nodding to the side. "Don't make me turn it into an order, Lance Corporal."

Will supposed that the worst of it might be that he'll pass out. At least then he won't be forced to be conscious for the rest of it.

He shifts on the grass, dipping his chin forward and showing the back of his head to Blake. The gentle touch of fingers hovers at his nape, just above the collar of his jacket. Water rains down through his hair suddenly, causing Will's shoulders to jump up to his ears. "Cold," he says, stupid in his shock. 

"Sorry." Blake's voice is tender, the humour gone. His fingers move into Will's hair, carding through it, gliding along his scalp. His touch is gentle. 

It's too much. 

Emotion wells up inside of Will, unbidden and obstinate. He sucks in a breath that turns itself in a sob that rings out loud in the quiet of the night. Blake doesn't say anything, just moves closer until Will is cradled between his outstretched legs, his front pressing into Will's back. His hands work through Will's hair in a steady motion, washing out the blood, working through the snarls and tangles until his cantine is empty, the last dribbles from it falling to the earth below them like rain. 

Blake's voice is close to Will's ear when he speaks. "Does it hurt?" he asks. 

A million different things flash through Will's mind. "It's agony," he says. 

Hands grip his shoulders tight. Will can feel Blake's cheek pressing into his back, directly in the middle his shoulders, warm even though the still-damp material of his uniform. "It's a miracle you're walking," Blake says. "That you made it at all. It's done now, Schofield. It's all right to stop now."

It's like his strings have been cut. Will lets himself fall onto Blake at his back, lets the man shoulder his weight for a moment. 

He's so tired, his body heavy. 

"Will you allow me to take a liberty, Blake?" he asks. 

Blake's hand settles across his chest in a loose embrace. His hand hooks on one of the straps of his jacket. "I feel like I owe you five different debts, so you might as well call me Joe," and though his tone sounds amused, Will can tell the words are serious. "What is it?"

Will tilts his head to the side, his nose grazing Blake's for a moment as he shifts, the two of them so close that Will's nose ends up in an awkward fold against the stubble dotting the hard slope of Blake's cheek. The rest of the men are a ways back, clusters of them keeping company, more of them sleeping, dead to the world, the tents housing the injured far enough away that Will can't even hear moaning. 

After all that's happened, that endless misery of a day. It's finally quiet. 

He brings his and Blake's lips together, if only for a moment. They break apart. It's possible they never joined; Will's imagination losing itself for a second.

Will has to remind himself what it means to breathe. There will be time to sort it all out, after.

"Will," Blake says, and his name has never sounded so lovely. Blake's hand moves from his chest, his warm palm coming to rest on Will's forehead, long fingers easily curving around the span of it, his touch an absolution and promise both. "It's all right to rest."

Cradled in Blake's warm embrace, Will closes his eyes.


End file.
